


something next to normal

by abstractwatercolor



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Tetralogy - Thomas Harris
Genre: ... I think, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Normal Life, Autistic Will Graham, But that’s okay because their lives are different here, Child Loss, F/F, Gen, Ghosts, Grief/Mourning, Hallucinations, Hannibal Lecter Shows Emotions, Hannibal Lecter is Not a Cannibal, Hannibal Lecter is not the Chesapeake Ripper, Happy Murder Family, Inspired by Next to Normal, It doesn't really have to do with the story but it's important to me that you know that, M/M, Married Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter, Mental Illness Treatment, Mental Instability, No Cannibalism, No murder, Parent Hannibal Lecter, Parent Will Graham, Physical Illness Treatment, Someone Helps Will Graham, They aren’t murder husbands they’re just husbands, Will Graham Has Encephalitis, Will Graham: Funny Man Having An Unfunny Time, Will and Hannibal are probably kind of OOC here, gratuitous references to canon, i think, kind of, once again I THINK, y'all know encephalitis can be recurrent and have relapses right?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 06:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 17,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29680017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abstractwatercolor/pseuds/abstractwatercolor
Summary: Will Graham-Lecter's life is perfect.  An adoring husband, two beautiful children, a job he enjoys, wealth, and stability.  Everything he could ever want.  But, of course, nothing in his world is ever quite what it seems, is it?
Relationships: Abigail Hobbs & Hannibal Lecter, Ardelia Mapp/Clarice Starling, Hannibal Lecter & Clarice Starling, Will Graham & Abigail Hobbs, Will Graham & Abigail Hobbs & Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham & Clarice Starling, Will Graham & Hannibal Lecter & Clarice Starling, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 19
Kudos: 48





	1. the perfect loving family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello lovely readers! This is my first foray into Hannibal fanfiction, having devoured the TV show in about a couple weeks, and I'm still building up my writing muscles in a way, so please forgive any innacuracies/ooc-ness (but also this is an AU so really how much does adherence to canon matter?). This is a story inspired by the musical Next To Normal, so there will be discussions of mental illness, drug use, and death. Please take care of yourselves and be mindful of that. At the end of each chapter, I'll note the songs (from the musical and possibly otherwise) that inspired or are parallel to each chapter if you'd care to explore the source material I'm pulling from.

Will sits in the dark and waits. He is patient. He knows that his prey will arrive, he simply needs to be there. He watches, shrouded in shadow, staring at the motionless door with the keen, perceptive gaze of a hunter. And then, finally, he is rewarded. The door opens with a soft whoosh of displaced air. His prey enters, quiet and slow, but at ease. Totally secure in the false belief of safety. Will decides to toy with that, let his prize believe itself free, so it stumbles further into the net under the leaves. And then he strikes.

“Abigail Mischa, do you know what time it is?”

She freezes, a doe caught in the headlights, seeing the car approach but paralyzed with blindness and fear. And then, as he clicks the lamp beside his armchair on, he can see her take a deep breath, forcing her tensed shoulders to relax. When she turns to face him, her casual expression is almost convincing. 

“Daddy,”she chirps brightly, as though she isn’t aware of how flagrantly she’s misstepped.The obvious attempt at manipulation almost makes Will laugh—She’s been calling him Dad rather than Daddy since she hit seventh grade. “I didn’t think you’d still be up.”

“Obviously,” Will hums, not amused or swayed, and Abigail’s shoulders droop in resignation.She’s a clever girl, after all, and knows when the jig is up. 

“Dad—“

“Tell me what time it is, Abigail.”He cuts her off, voice firm and steady as he stares her down. 

Abigail heaves a huge sigh, in the manner of teenagers everywhere, as she fishes her phone out of her pocket and gives it a quick glance.“It’s two a.m.”

Will shifts forward in his chair, the feigned air of casualty falling away as he rests his hands on the tops of his thighs. “And you think that’s an appropriate time to be getting home?”

Abigail rolls her eyes—Blue, like his own, but a lighter shade, and all too prone to rolling as of late—and answers “No,” in a flippant, nearly bored tone that makes Will grit his teeth.Instead of snapping, he simply holds out a hand imperiously. 

“Phone.”

Abigail’s hand tightens around the coveted device, and a spark of defiance flares in her eyes.“I thought Papa was the dramatic one. But here you are, lurking in the dark like a creep and all.”

Will refused to rise to the bait. “Abigail.  _Phone_.”

With a groan as though he was wrenching her heart out, Abigail placed the phone in his waiting hand.Will stands and stretches, slipping it into his own pocket even as he internally bemoans the aches and soreness that have started creeping into his bones without his permission. “We  _are_ going to discuss this, Abby,” he warns, “But since it is, in fact, two in the morning, I for one would like to get some sleep. Go to your room and we can talk about this tomorrow.”

“You need to let go, Dad. I’m almost eighteen.”But Abigail complies, toeing her shoes off and heading down the hallway towards the stairs. 

"Are you snorting coke?" Will calls after her, not because he truly thinks she might be, but to needle her, drain away a little of the frustration boiling between them.

At the foot of the stairs, Abigail turns to look back at him, one hand on a hip, and her eyebrows raised almost to her hairline as she answers with sugary-sweet feigned innocence, "Not at the moment, Daddy."

He heads up the stairs himself after he hears Abby's door click shut, satisfied that all his family is now safe and sound at home, tucked away in bed. Now, with the children taken care of, he can finally go back to bed, and to the man in the aforementioned bed, which is just as tantalizing a prospect as the sleeping. That was starting to seem more and more like a wonderful idea.After all, if Abigail thought it appropriate to be out gallivanting at this time of night, there was no reason for him not to have a little late-night enjoyment in his own bedroom. _But maybe not just yet_ , he thinks as he pauses by the second door from the landing, light still spilling out onto the floor from the door hanging slightly ajar. 

“Clarice?” He calls softly, with a gentle rap of his knuckles against the wood as he pokes his head into her room.There, decidedly not asleep, is his younger daughter, hunched over her desk despite the late hour.She spins in her chair at the sound of his voice, and he can plainly see the aggravating mix of exhaustion and stubbornness etched into her face. 

“Hey, Dad,” she yawns, despite the can of Monster Will can clearly see on her desk—And he really needs to have another talk with her about that, both her flaunting of their _No food or drinks in the bedrooms_ rule and her obvious disregard for the ban upon energy drinks that her other father has placed upon the house.

“Darlin’, it’s two in the morning, is everything okay?”

“It’s fine,” Clarice grates out, the obviously forced cheer almost painful to hear, “It’s great, everything’s great, why wouldn’t it be great?It’s not like I have four geography worksheets, two chapters worth of math homework, and three science logs due this week, not to  mention a five-page essay on subtext in The Great Gatsby, too.Like, what am I gonna write that about, yeah? I have two dads. Newsflash! The subtext is _they’re gay!_ ”

Will just blinks in response, stunned and maybe a little frightened at the intensity of his little girl’s manic energy.“Sweetie,” he says in the most soothing voice he can conjure, “You need to slow down. Take some time for yourself. We all need that sometimes, even me. I’m going to go have sex with your father.”

“Great,”Clarice intones, her voice somehow both flat and dripping with sarcasm, “Thanks. I’m so glad I know that.”

* * *

When he returns to bed, casually lifting his sleeping husband’s arm, slotting himself back into his usual spot, and draping the aforementioned arm over his own waist, he feels his husband wake more than he sees or hears it. Hannibal sighs softly, nuzzling into Will’s neck for a moment before sleepily murmuring, accent thick with sleep, “I thought I heard your voice downstairs.”

Will has a brief mental debate with himself re: ratting Abigail out, before deciding that, really, having her phone confiscated was punishment enough for a normal teenage offense like staying out late, and Abby really didn’t need Hannibal getting on her case when she’d already received her due scolding. 

“Oh, just me talking to myself,” he lies breezily, pressing himself close, “Have to get an expert opinion on my thoughts sometimes, y’know?”

Hannibal’s answering chuckle is low and affectionate, and Will feels, just for a moment, the ridiculous urge to preen in pride at having amused him.Incredible how the man beside him could still stir the most nonsensical reactions in Will, even after all these years. 

“An expert opinion on thoughts and you didn’t come to your husband, the psychiatrist?You wound me, beloved.”

Will grins and loops an arm around his husband’s neck, fingertips finding the short, baby-soft hair at the nape and absently rubbing against them. “Why, Doctor Lecter, it would be highly unethical for your husband to be your patient, wouldn’t it?”

“I have bent rules for you before, my Will, and I would happily bend them again,”He sounds utterly sincere, despite the teasing nature of the conversation, and Will marvels momentarily how he managed to not only catch but keep the attention and affection of such an intense man. 

“You bend thing enough times and they break. How many things are you willing to break for me, huh?”

“Anything,”The answer is barely more than a breath against his ear, but Will shivers, and tightens his grip on his love’s neck to drag him into a kiss that effectively ends that conversation.

* * *

Hannibal has already left home, an early appointment demanding an even earlier than usual departure, when Clarice plods down the stairs the next morning, Will sipping a cup of coffee at the table while Abigail, still daring despite the previous night’s debacle, perches on the counter island, her feet swinging lazily as they hang beneath her. Beside her sit the lunches, leftovers from the previous night’s supper, that Hannibal had prepared for all of them before he went to bed.And, of course, a plate of sausage and eggs on the table for Clarice’s breakfast. 

“Morning, sunshine!” Abigail quips, undeniable mirth crossing her face at the sight of the younger girl’s dishevelment. Will shoots her a warning look, but Abigail doesn’t heed him, giggling as Clarice collapses dramatically into the chair beside Will’s without deigning to acknowledge her sister. 

They look so alike, his two beautiful girls. The same huge baby blues, the same dark hair, the same delicacy to their features that makes Will sometimes ache with the need to protect them from all the things in the world he knows can hurt pretty little girls.They look like each other, and they look like him, despite the lack of a biological link between any of the three. He wonders, sometimes, if it ever bothers Hannibal that neither of their daughters resemble  him more. Clarice, by some happy accident of fate, has similarities to her other father, their cheekbones, the angles and sharpness of their faces, but it's Will's coloring she has, Will who is most often assumed to be her biological father. But it’s not like their lack of Hannibal’s DNA has ever made him love their daughters any less, and so Will has never brought it up. 

“Well, I’ve got to get headed,” he says as he rises, “Classes wait for no man.”

“Classes  _should _ wait for you, since you’re the one teaching them,” Clarice replies, not looking up from her plate, and Will chuckles as he presses a kiss to the top of her head. 

“Still, I’ve got to go. You make sure you catch the bus, yeah?”The words are directed to Clarice, but he meets Abigail’s eyes as he says them, her impish grin no less suspicious for its adorableness. 

“Yes, Dad,” the girls answer in unison, and Will heads for the door humming, only to pause at the door.He feels, abruptly, as though he is the only still thing in a blur of movement, the room around him inexplicably in motion, like a globe set spinning by a curious child. 

He reaches out to steady himself, but he’s forgotten about his coffee. The cup falls from his hand, and shatters on the ground.Shit.Hannibal is going to lecture his ear off for that one. 

“Dad?”He turns, feeling motion-sick with the act, to see Clarice standing in the entryway to the kitchen, a look of confused anxiety marring her face.He can see the kitchen island behind her, but Abigail isn’t where she’d been sat when he turned away. How odd. 

“... I think the house is spinning.”

* * *

Clarice calls her Papa once she gets to school. She knows his work is important, of course, and she really shouldn't bother him, but the incident with Dad before she left has her rattled, and she can't help but feel the need to hear her other father's voice. To know that things are still okay.

He answers the phone with a crisp "Doctor Lecter speaking," and his voice fills her with calm, steady and accented and as familiar as breathing. Even if it's odd to hear him refer to himself without the hyphenated surname, but she knows why Papa insists on using his original name professionally, and insists on Dad doing the same. _Why should I not keep going by Doctor Lecter?_ he had said once when Clarice asked, _I went to medical school, my husband did not_. Dad had gasped theatrically at that, dramatically staggering against the counter as though Papa had gutted him, and all three of them had dissolved into laughter.

"Papa?"

"Hello, Clarice," His professional detachment fades away, into something warm and fond, and Clarice can't help but brighten.

"Papa, Daddy was really weird this morning," she says softly, closing the door of the instrumental practice room she'd booked for before school behind her, to be sure she isn't overheard.

"Your father, little bird, is always weird," Papa replies, but Clarice can almost picture the way his hand would tighten instinctively on the phone as he hesitates before asking, "Weird how?"

" _Weird_ weird. He was going out the door and suddenly started shaking, and said the house was spinning. He dropped his favorite mug and it broke. There was coffee all over the floor."

"Did the shards hurt any of you?" The relaxed tone of her father's voice is gone now, voice tight despite how he always projected an air of calm.

"No, I cleaned it up after he left."

"Clarice..."

"It's fine, Papa, I can deal with messes. I'm just worried about him."

"Don't fret about it, hmm? I'll take care of him. We just need to pay another visit to Doctor Sutcliffe."

Doctor Sutcliffe. Clarice hates him, and she knows her dad feels the same. Papa's old friend or not, he gives off a distinct aura of off-putting sliminess. 

"If you think that's a good idea," she sighs, and she can hear him chuckle softly.

"I do, and I will take care of everything. Alright? Don't worry, Dad will be perfectly fine. We can talk about it at home tonight, but I'm afraid I have a patient due to arrive in a few minutes, so I must let you go."

"Okay, Papa," she feels like a little girl again, frightened by a nightmare and crawling into her parents' bed for solace. "I love you."

"As I love you, my bird." And then, with a click, he's gone. Clarice sighs, plopping onto the chair before the little electric keyboard the school provides for piano players. Not nearly as good as the real piano she has at home, of course, but it will suit the purpose. She knows her papa always pretends to bemoan the fact that Clarice was drawn to piano rather than the harpsichord or the theremin, but also knows he's proud of her, the talent she has worked so hard to cultivate. To hone it into a skill. In a way, a weapon. A way out.

She fumbles around in her bag until she finds the sheet music she's supposed to practice today and pulls it out. Mozart. Another crazy person, if the things she's read are right. Absolutely batshit, Mozart was. Supposedly, that made his art all the better, though she doesn't quite understand how. His music doesn't sound crazy. It's balanced, nimble, beautiful. When Clarice plays, the rest of the world melts away. There is only the notes on the paper, the keys, and her, lovely sounds coaxed out precisely from each tiny muscle movement of her fingers.

She's so absorbed in the music, in fact, that she loses time, blissfully letting her brain turn off until she's jolted out of her concentration by the sound of the door opening. In the doorway stands a girl. Taller than Clarice, with dark eyes and curly black hair, undeniably pretty, but Clarice is too annoyed and too busy to be distracted by some girl, even if she has eyes like her dads' coffee and a hesitant smile.

"I still have this practice room reserved for--" she glances at the clock, "Seven and a half minutes."

"Oh, I know," the girl says easily, then pauses and, as if flustered, adds, "I just like to listen."

"Uh-huh."

The girl steps forward, into the room, without being invited, and Clarice ignores the voice in her head that sounds like her papa, murmuring _rude_ in a voice as soft and fleeting as the brush of a moth's wing. 

"I'm Ardelia," The girl offers.

"Clarice," she replies, simply to be polite. She might not have time to chat, but she'd been raised with manners.

"I know."

Now that is something to catch her attention. She looks up from the music she'd been absently scanning. "That's... kind of creepy that you know."

Ardelia's smile vanishes. "We've gone to school together for, like, six years. I sit behind you in four classes."

"Also creepy." Another glance at the clock. "Seven minutes."

Ardelia, of the curly hair and the coffee eyes, turns to go, and her hand has just barely touched the doorknob when Clarice laughs. "You give up way too easy."

And she turns, that smile back, and wider now with hope.

* * *

When Will's final class of the day files out of his classroom, someone else comes in. Hannibal, looking as out of place in a college as Will is at some fancy soiree in his fancy suit, strolls right in as though he had every reason to be there.

Will looks up from his papers at the sound of someone walking _towards_ him rather than away from him, and he only sighs. "You're off work early?"

"Hello to you too, my heart," Hannibal's eyes sparkle with amusement as he leans against Will's desk. "And yes, if you must know, I had an unfortunate spat of last-minute rescheduling this afternoon."

Will raises his eyebrows, and in response, Hannibal raises only one. Damn him. Will has always wanted to be able to do that, and Hannibal just flaunts it, the smug bastard.

"Was it your patients doing the rescheduling or you?"

"Does it matter?"

Which is all the answer he needs. " _Hannibal_."

His husband straightens up, his face the very image of a concerned, well-meaning spouse. "Do you not want my company, Will?"

"You know that isn't what I mean. I'm fine."

"I'm sure you are. I only wanted to check on you... Clarice said you had an episode this morning, and I thought we could book an appointment at Doctor Sutcliffe's to make sure you aren't having a flare-up."

Will bites his lip to keep from snapping. It's not worth raising his voice in public over, even if he's irritated. "It wasn't an episode, it was a dizzy spell, and I'm totally fine. I'm not having a flare-up."

"Will," And oh, Lord Almighty, he hates how persuasive his husband can be. It comes with the territory, he assumes, of being a therapist, but it's almost rage-inducing how easily Hannibal can cajole Will with just his voice and those whiskey-colored eyes. "Indulge me, darling."

And just like that, Will's stubborn resolve crumbles like a sandcastle. He holds a hand out and Hannibal comes willingly, humming a soft sound of contentment as Will tucks his head under the taller man's chin.

"Clarie and I had a chat this morning."

"On the subject of?"

"She thinks The Great Gatsby is gay."

Will can feel Hannibal's chuckle rumble through his chest under Will's cheek.

"She thinks correctly. The Great Gatsby is incredibly gay."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Prelude" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "Just Another Day" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "Everything Else" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack


	2. the medicine or the marriage

“Hannibal, Will, how wonderful to see you.” 

Hannibal’s former colleague has always been irritatingly false, behaving like they’re just old friends popping in for a visit rather than a patient at his practice. Of all the things about Donald Sutcliffe that upsets Will Graham-Lecter, the _sheer insincerity_ is easily towards the top of the list. Still, he is the doctor who made time to see Will when Will was just the fiancé of an old coworker with a mysterious illness driving him mad. The one who diagnosed and medicated his encephalitis, who continues to make time to squeeze them in whenever they -- Hannibal, really -- express concern. And so Will endures the presence and company of such an odious man for the sake of his health and his tenuous grip on sanity.

“Doctor Sutcliffe,” He manages to put on his most polite voice he reserves for talking to people he doesn’t like.

It’s the usual routine. MRI and blood draws and temperature checks and all that. Hannibal leaning over Doctor Sutcliffe’s shoulder to peer at the images of Will’s brain. Will pretending it doesn’t make him shiver with revulsion at the thought of other people, even his soulmate, seeing the inside of his head. Making him feel overexposed and violated. Empath he may be, but the actual act of looking at a brain, even just an MRI image, makes him want to squirm.

As it turns out, there is some inflammation in his brain, which explains the return of his headaches and dizziness. But Sutcliffe also suggests that Will visit a friend of his for better treatment of his anxiety and depression, a psychopharmacologist. He scribbles down a recommendation and hands it to Hannibal -- And doesn’t that grind Will's gears, still, even after so long? Having doctors address his husband rather than himself just because Hannibal is a doctor. Hannibal scans the paper perfunctorily, then suddenly stops and furrows his brow.

“A Doctor Dahmer? Really, Donald, this poor man must have had a dreadful time in medical school.”

At that, Will can’t hold back a snort. “Your name rhymes with _cannibal_.”

Hannibal shoots him an overdramatic look of betrayal at that, though Will can see the slightest hint of a smile curling at the edge of his mouth.

* * *

“What’s your middle name?”

Clarice looks up from her laptop, Gatsby essay in progress on the screen, to turn her gaze to Ardelia. The rehearsal room where they officially met has become something of a meeting place for them, and the close quarters makes her belly flutter with a warm sort of excitement. “What?”

“Your middle name. What is it?” Ardelia repeats, and Clarice groans softly. She hates that question more than possibly any other, excepting of course the nasty kind of “questions” some rude, homophobic people sometimes ask about her dads.

“Oh, come on, it can’t be that bad. I mean, my middle name is Louise, which is, like, an old lady name. Ardelia Louise sounds like I should already be playing bingo.”

“Louise is nice,” Clarice counters mildly, “My middle name is just embarrassing.”

“Tell me.”

Clarice shakes her head, and quick as a snake, Ardelia’s hand strikes out. Her fingers land just beneath Clarice’s ribs, and Clarice slaps a hand over her own mouth to muffle a squeal.

“Hey! Tickling is no fair!”

“Tell me your middle name and I won’t do it anymore.”

And Clarice heaves a sigh of defeat.

“It’s Starling.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Yeah. Starling. It was my… my bio mom’s last name. My dads already had my first name picked and I guess they liked the sound of her last name with it so they…. borrowed it.”

Ardelia considers that for a moment, her lips pursed in thought.

“What do you know about her? Your mother?”

Clarice closes her eyes, tries to conjure what she imagines the woman who bore her might look like. But no matter what, any time she tries to bring her to mind, nothing comes. All she can picture when she thinks of parents are the ones she _has_ , the ones who raised her. Her dad’s dark curls and eyes like denim and goofy smile. Her papa’s quiet grace and cheekbones sharp as knives and soft, lilting accent.

“I know she was my age when she had me. Way too young to raise a baby. I know she chose my dads out of a list of couples looking to adopt and they met, and she decided to… to give me to them. They didn’t know her well, but she didn’t want them to. She just wanted it all to go away. Closed adoption and all that. No contact. Get it over with and hand me off and be done.”

“Do you know her name?”

“Jodie.”

They are silent for a few minutes, only the sounds of Clarice’s laptop keys clicking and Ardelia’s pencil scratching.

“So,” Ardelia says finally, nudging Clarice’s foot with her own, “Clarice Starling Graham-Lecter, huh? Quite the mouthful. Do your dads hate you or something?”

Clarice laughs. “Y’know, sometimes, I think they actually might.”

“Where are you from?”

Clarice knows the reasoning behind that question, but she chooses to toy with her a little longer. “What, never met someone from Minnesota before?”

“Minnesota?”

“Yeah,” she shrugs, “We lived there for a while when I was growing up. Moved here when I was ten.” And even though it’s been six years since, she still vividly remembers why they left. The odd looks and rude whispers she noticed more and more as she got older, the frigid silence she sometimes got from kids at school whose parents told them Clarice was someone they had to avoid. Their neighbor, Mrs. Schurr, who told her daughter within the Graham-Lecters’ hearing that she didn’t want Marissa associating with _people like that._

And the straw that finally, fatally broke the camel’s back -- The day they came home one day to find a single word scrawled across the garage door in spray-paint, a word her fathers’ made her swear to never, _ever_ repeat. Sometimes, in her dreams, she can still see that day, the way her papa’s lips pressed tight together as they three got out of the car, disgust and rage in his eyes as he stared up at it. The way her dad gasped wetly and cursed on a shaky exhale, and Papa didn’t even scold him for it.

“Shut your eyes, Clarice,” Papa had said, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away. She was transfixed, horribly, by the sight of their house marred by such foulness, such cruelty towards their family.

She remembers the way her dad’s face crumpled, a choked-off sob hitching in his throat, and the way it made her papa’s carefully blank mask crack.

“Will…”

“We’re leaving, Han. We have to get out of here.”

A gentle tap on her shoulder snaps Clarice out her memories, and she shakes her head to chase away the phantom image of a slur painted on her home.

“Sorry, sorry, I was just… lost in thought.”

“About Minnesota?” Ardelia asks, and Clarice hums softly in response.

“Something like that.”

“You don’t sound like you’re from Minnesota. I mean, sometimes your accent is kinda weird.”

That brings Clarice’s smile back, despite herself. “My dad is from Louisiana and my papa is from Lithuania. Sometimes they say it’s amazing anyone can understand me.”

“They sound nice. I’d love to meet them.”

Clarice closes her eyes, imagining Ardelia, all coffee eyes and stupid jokes, meeting her fathers -- Papa’s intimidating intelligence and pretentious, snobby cooking. The sharp blade of Dad’s perception, his manic energy and penchant for forgetting his filters.

“Deels, trust me. My dads are… a lot.”

* * *

Doctor Henry Dahmer, as it turns out, has quite a sense of self-deprecating humor when it comes to his unfortunate surname. He smiles when Will makes an awkward joke about it, and even chuckles when Will brings up that his spouse also has a name that doesn't inspire much confidence.

At least they have a moment of levity before they start getting into the nitty-gritty of the various illnesses, neuroses and traumas that make up Will Graham-Lecter.

In the car outside Dahmer's office, Hannibal waits. He is patient, and waiting while his beloved sees doctors has become an old routine by now. Maybe this time, this doctor, this treatment, will finally make everything alright again. This hoping, too, is routine. Still, it's easier to hope than to accept that things might never be alright again, never as they were before. That maybe Will is too ill, too damaged, to be the same Will he had fallen in love with two decades before.

Two decades. Heaven help him, Hannibal felt old. Old and tired. He hadn't exactly been a young man, when they met, but he had been younger, and surrounded by glamor and elegance. Enraptured by a charming, figety teacher who made speeches about his deep discomfort with eye contact while also possessing the most captivating eyes Hannibal had ever seen. Will, and then their family, had changed him, settled him, but had also made him quiet and more closed-off and so _deeply_ tired.

* * *

They are hanging out at Ardelia's house, flopped across her bed with their feet dangling off, when Ardelia suddenly says, "Did you know that our bodies are basically killing us from the moment we're born?"

Clarice huffs a laugh, startled and amused at once. "Did you know Mary Shelley kept her dead husband's heart wrapped in a poem he wrote about a friend of theirs who died?"

Ardelia sits up, eyes gone huge. "She did not!"

"She did, I swear," Abigail insists, "And she got laid on her mom's grave."

Ardelia throws her head back at that, laughing a deep, real laugh that makes Clarice feel like she's sinking into a hot bath. "Oh, sick. That's pretty hardcore."

"You've really gotta love somebody to bang them in a graveyard."

Clarice's hand is laying in the space between them. She hadn't noticed it, until Ardelia picks it up, and Clarice almost gasps at the warm tingles she swears shoots up her arm.

"Not to be less badass than Mary Shelley, but I'd do anything you wanted in a graveyard."

Clarice blinks. Blinks again. "'Scuse me?"

"I mean," Ardelia looks down, suddenly shy, "Not bang you there, 'cause we haven't known each other that long, but..."

Oh. _Oh._

She feels as though there's something warm and bright, like molten gold, wrapping around her heart. She had always expected, if anyone were ever to want her, to be frightened, too busy and too weird and too other to be in a relationship. But this, here, with Ardelia, doesn't frighten her. It feels solid and comfortable and right, in a way Clarice can't quite put into words. It feels like the last piece of a puzzle clicking into place. Like the smell of her papa making her favorite food, or her dad's laughter when she tries to cast a fishing line and gets tangled up.

"I love you too."

* * *

Will is having a rough time. Rougher than usual, even. Medicating mental problems wasn't a very exact science, and there were bound to be some tweaks that needed to be made before things could settle and Will's messed up brain chemistry could be regulated. He had known that going into this. But that doesn't make it easier.

At first, the dizziness worsens. The adjustment to fix that makes the headaches more frequent. They go back to the doctor. His headaches and dizziness disappear, but they're quickly replaced by a numbness that starts in his toes and travels upward to his fingers. Another tweak to the prescription. He's bloated and restless, and constipated, which doesn't exactly make him feel very attractive. Thankfully, he has zero desire for sex, a fact which he points out to Doctor Dahmer, who professionally makes a note.

How very strange that this man knows everything about Will, all his secrets and yearnings and trauma, and all Will knows about him is his name. A very intense but unequal relationship.

"I'm nauseous, I have no appetite," He reports at his latest appointment, "And I've _gained_ six pounds. Which, y'know, just ain't fair." 

They adjust his medication once again. The world slowly becomes less overexposed and blinding, becoming something quieter, easier to manage, easier to navigate. The overwhelming highs and lows fade, evening out to a sort of bland plateau of normalcy. He feels far away from himself, as though he's watching his life happen to him from afar.

"I don't feel like myself," He confesses in the sterile discomfort of Doctor Dahmer's office, "I... I don't feel anything."

Will is declared stable and more or less sane.

Hannibal presses a kiss to his forehead when he hears, murmuring a "Well done," that almost makes Will flinch.

After two weeks on his new regimen, Will has a startling realization -- He isn't _supposed_ to be feeling nothing. The medicine is meant to be making him feel better, not stripping away everything so he can't feel. His mind feels far away and hazy, as though he's lost in a thick fog.

For a few days, he wonders what to do about it. He knows he's not well, that the medications he's on are to help him. But he doesn't feel like they're helping. He feels like they're suffocating him, holding his head under a heavy blanket of gray that leaves no room for anything. True, he doesn't feel awful anymore, but does that really matter when he also can't feel anything good?

He makes his decision one evening, watching Clarice arrive home. She's been spending more and more time with a friend, who drives her home rather than Clarice catching the bus. Will, watching from the window, is just about to call a greeting, when he sees her friend -- Her name starts with an A, he thinks. Maybe. It's been hard to take in details with his head caught in the fog -- lean forward to capture her lips in a kiss before Clarice can open the car door. Quickly, he yanks the curtain closed to hide himself.

"Are you spying on your own daughter?" Abigail, lying on the couch and flipping idly through some glossy, colorful magazine, drawls teasingly.

"When did Clarie get a girlfriend?" Will demands instead of confessing that he is, "How could I miss something like that?"

"You miss a lot." His eldest snarks, and Will rolls his eyes.

"Why don't you get your shoes off the couch and start on your homework before your papa gets home?"

Abigail groans, throwing an arm over her eyes, but Will can hear a fine balance between teenage rebelliousness and actual hurt as she asks, "Why does he hate me?"

"Because you're a little twat. Now go."

He heads towards the stairs before Abigail moves, but he hears her shout after him. "You're my dad, you're not allowed to call me a twat!"

Five minutes later, both the girls safely home but Hannibal still at the office for some later patients, Will stands in the upstairs bathroom, staring at the row of little orange pill bottles assembled on the counter before him. He misses the way things were before. The things he felt when he cared about his work, when he was falling in love, when his daughters were growing up. When he could love the three of them with all of himself, not some faded, washed-out version of emotion he could barely find in the haze. He misses feeling. Even when it wasn't dizzyingly good, even when he was dropping into his deepest lows, at least it was _something_.

He remembers when he was the one being charmed and wooed and kissed senseless in a parked car when they thought nobody was looking. He remembers the overwhelming love he felt that night in Florence, on a ridiculously expensive vacation they didn't really need, when Hannibal begged on his knees for his hand in front of a Bottecelli painting. When Will said yes with tears in his eyes and Hannibal lit up as if he hadn't expected that answer.

Remembers the way that Hannibal held him then, the way they kissed until he was sure his mouth would bruise. 

_If I saw you every day, forever, Will, I would remember this time._

Every day, forever. Will had wanted that. To love him every day, forever, with no clouds over his eyes, no silencer muffling his heart. He double-checks that the door is locked behind him before he picks up the first bottle.

He didn't want to live a muffled life, tamped down by medications. If mania or sorrow or even illness was the price of feeling anything at all, he was willing to pay. 

Every day, forever.

The pills disappeared with a satisfying flush.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Who's Crazy/My Psychopharmacologist & I" -- Next to Normal soundtrack
> 
> "Perfect For You" -- Next to Normal soundtrack
> 
> "I Miss the Mountains" -- Next to Normal soundtrack
> 
> Also, nobody cares, but I thought it would be fun to let you know that in my head, Clarice and Ardelia are played by Chloe Grace Moretz and China Anne McClain


	3. do you dream or do you grieve?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel the need to make it very clear that the Will in this fic is not thinking rationally or making good decisions, and you should never, EVER stop/reduce your meds without consulting the doctor who prescribed them to you.

Hannibal is having a great time. Will is happy again, not the anxious mess he tended towards at times, not the listless apathy he’d struggled with when his medication was being adjusted, but happy. He seems genuinely happy, brilliant and vibrant, almost like he had been in the time before his illness, his depression, and everything that had befallen them. Like this, Hannibal could see the Will from those long-ago years in the man Will had become since then. He still has that fire, that same spark of wildness, that had drawn Hannibal to him twenty years ago.

Will is full of energy again, constantly in motion -- Making his lures, working on his lesson plans, helping Hannibal in the kitchen, cracking horrible jokes to make Clarice giggle. And the sex is amazing again. Hannibal adores his Will, loves him no matter what they do or don’t do in the bedroom, but he is human enough to admit that the full-force return of his husband’s libido has been a _definite_ perk to the situation.

“Good morning,” he hums as he feels Will’s familiar arms wind around him as he cooks. The warmth of him is comforting as he presses his face into the plush softness of Hannibal’s robe.

“Hey, you,” Will’s voice is rough with sleep, tiredness lengthening his vowels with just a trace of the southern drawl he had been taught by the FBI academy to try to hide. “What’s for breakfast?”

Hannibal prods the mixture frying in the pan with a spatula. “Ham and cheese frittatas.”

“Mmm, sounds good.”

“Have I ever made you something that wasn’t good?”

Will’s chuckle against his back sends a pleasant vibration through Hannibal, and his arms tighten briefly in a fond squeeze. “I’ll never question your skills again.”

“See that you don’t.”

Will pulls away then, and it takes a great deal of self-control to not complain at the loss of contact. After all, Will is only steps away, and Hannibal can see him, out of the corner of his eye, starting up the French press. His Will is, in Hannibal’s humble opinion, especially divine in slow, lazy mornings like these. His cheeks are still flushed a delicate pink from sleep, and his curls are beautifully disheveled, sticking out every which way with no attempt at all to tame them. He makes Hannibal think of Ganymede, the mortal boy so captivating that the mighty Zeus himself would scoop him up from the earth, to hoard and covet his beauty all for himself.

If Hannibal could, he would keep Will somewhere out of sight, only for himself and their family, where his beauty could only be seen by those who would truly appreciate it. It’s a dark, possessive notion, but some secret part of Hannibal relishes the idea. 

As he pulls a cup from the coffee machine, Will notices Hannibal’s gaze on him, and his eyes -- Dark, _dark_ blue, like the ocean and denim and the night sky just before the stars come out -- light up with amusement. “See something you like?” he asks, a coy smile thrown Hannibal’s way as if he doesn’t know exactly how desirable he is to Hannibal. The way Hannibal would eagerly devour him if only Will gave him permission. If Hannibal was not so fastidious about keeping his kitchen clean, he would have his husband right there and then.

As things are, Hannibal deliberately keeps his voice steady and mild as he replies, “Were it not for the risk of our breakfast burning, my love, I would be shoving you against the counter at this moment.”

Will’s answering laughter is warm and dark and full of love, and Hannibal can’t help the grin that spreads across his own face.

* * *

“I want to go fishing,” Abigail says one day in the week leading up to her birthday, “For my birthday. To try out the new lures we made. Please, Dad?”

Will has never been able to deny her anything. He indulges her, Hannibal would say, he spoils her. But Will can’t help it. She’s their oldest, their first, the precious little girl who made them parents. If she asks for something, with those big ice-blue eyes and that puppy-like tilt of her head, he can’t bring himself to tell her no. And, after all, if a headstrong teenage girl about to be an adult’s birthday wish is to actually spend time with one of her fathers, can Will really afford to pass that opportunity up?

“Anything you want, baby.” He says easily, and delights in the way she smiles. “We can go out, all four of us together. I don’t know if you papa would be willing to wear something as undignified as waders, but we can certainly try to talk him into it, and we can maybe pry your sister away from that girl of hers, A whatever...”

“No.” Abigail’s voice is sharp, and Will is startled by the sudden vehemence in her tone. “Only you. I want it to be just us.”

“Okay,” Will assures her, “We can go fishing, just us, and then we can do something else with Papa and Clarice another time.”

Abigail grimaces, hunching in on herself and refusing to meet Will’s eyes. “Papa hates me.” And oh, _shit_ , it stings Will how utterly certain she sounds. “Clarie too. They hate me, and they want me to go away.”

“Abby, they love you. Of course they love you. They’re your family as much as I am, they love you just like I do.”

Abby looks up, then, and her eyes are hurt and cold and sure. “They don’t. You’re the only one who understands me. You actually want me.”

“You’re adopted, Abigail,” Will replies, trying to lighten her mood with an old family joke, “You wouldn’t be here if your papa and I didn’t both want you to be. Ready-made kid, remember?”

She doesn’t brighten as he’d hoped she would, only staring up at him with that dark, surly look. Teenagers. Will had been told they would be difficult, but he hadn’t quite expected to really see it, not from his Abigail. How could she have grown up so fast? It just wasn’t fair. When he looked at her, sometimes, he could still see her as the baby she had been, all those years ago. 

* * *

"It's kinda funny, when you think about it," Ardelia says, lingering on the porch, "I mean, I have a mom and no dad, and you have no mom and two dads."

"Transitive property," Clarice giggles, despite herself. She should pull away, should say goodbye and vanish into the house, but she lets herself stay, her fingers twined with Ardelia's. Basking in the warmth and comfort of her company, the love she knows is there despite them not having really talked about it. 

"We could share," Ardelia hums, and the hopeful lilt in her voice makes Clarice bite her lip. Clarice needs there to be a threshold, a barrier. A hard line between her two different lives -- The one with her family, as unconventional and loving, and messed up as they are, and the one with Ardelia, where things are simple and easy. She doesn't know what she would do if the two worlds began to blur, if the safety and stability of Ardelia meshed with the energy and chaos of her fathers.

At the look on her face, Ardelia raises an eyebrow, clearly not impressed with the things Clarice must be showing on her face. "We've been dating for nine weeks and four days, and I still haven't met your parents."

"Wait, you keep count?"

"Yeah."

And Clarice can't help but laugh. "Things with my parents are intense, Deels. And messy and weird, and..."

A car door opens and shuts, and Clarice looks up to see her papa walking towards the porch. Well, _fuck_.

"Clarice!" He says warmly as he reaches them, "And this must be Amelia!"

"Ardelia, sir," Ardelia supplies, and her father nods. Odd, Papa usually hates being corrected, sees it as rude. He must be in an especially good mood today.

"It's wonderful to meet you, Ardelia. Why don't you join us for dinner?"

Oh no. Oh no, no, no, that cannot happen.

"Papa," she blurts desperately, "Ardelia really can't stay."

Papa offers Ardelia his arm, all proper old manners, and Ardelia links her arm with his, grinning. 

"She's got... homework!"

Her father and girlfriend sweep past her into the house. Her two worlds, officially melding together, like two different colors of Play-Doh, smashed into each other by a toddler.

"Surgery!" She tries again, following after them with feet that feel like her shoes are full of concrete.

"It's going to be good," Papa says to Ardelia, conspiratorily, and Clarice wants to scream.

_"Rabies!"_

They both laugh then, looking back at her with fond smiles that do nothing to halt the waves of anxious nausea that roil in her belly.

"It's okay, Clarie," Ardelia says, brightly, "Your dad says it's gonna be good."

"We'll sit down together and have a lovely meal," Papa assures her. It doesn't help. "Ardelia here can even be my sous-chef, if she likes."

After that, things seem to blur. There are no huge disasters, no blowups or meltdowns. Papa, who makes Clarice's favorite food for the occasion, is at his most charming, and Dad even behaves himself, smiling and chatting politely, and not once saying anything pointed or inappropriate. Ardelia is sweet and funny, as always, and laughs at their jokes and asks questions at all the right points. It really is good. And yet, Clarice cannot shake the feeling that something is wrong, something is bubbling under the surface, like static electricity building as you drag your socks along the carpet.

And then, at the end of the meal, after Papa has cleared the dishes away, Dad vanishes into the kitchen. A moment later, he reappears, a cake with lit candles in his hands, as he playfully sing-songs, "It's someone's birthday!"

And there it is. The spark that starts the blaze.

“Will?” Hannibal is rising from his chair, his voice and body language wary.

Will wonders what his problem is. He’s just trying to have a nice celebration for their little girl. Doesn’t he want her to be happy? He should just sit down and let Abby blow her candles out before the candle-wax drips onto the cake.

“What is it?” He asks, trying to bite back his impatience. Foolish man, always trying to make a big ordeal out of nothing.

“Will, my darling, what are you doing?”

He rolls his eyes at that, not caring if Clarice or the charming young lady sitting next to her see. “Honestly, Hannibal, I am _trying_ to celebrate our daughter’s birthday.”

Hannibal sucks in a breath like he’s been struck, and Will hears Clarice hiss under her breath, “Goddammit.”

“I didn’t know it was your birthday,” Her friend says in an undertone.

Clarice mumbles back, “It’s not.”

“You have a sister?”

“No.”

That doesn’t make any sense. Of course Clarice has a sister. Abigail is sitting right there… or she had been, Will realizes with a glance. Hadn’t she? She’d been there a moment ago.

And then Hannibal says “Oh, _Will_ ,” with such an aching tenderness that it makes Will feel hollow somewhere deep inside.

“Hannibal?” He is reaching, suddenly frightened, for the one reliable tether to stability he can count on, feeling like a balloon abruptly cut loose from the weight holding it to the earth.

The cake in his hands is slowly being splattered with droplets of wax. Hannibal steps forward, slow and careful, with his hands held palm-out at chest level. Every movement carefully telegraphed, voice low and calm despite the tension Will can see in every inch of him. Like soothing a wild animal.

“Why don’t you put the cake down on the table?”

And Will complies automatically, setting the dessert onto the table. The candles are still burning, even as they melt. As soon as his hands are free, Hannibal reaches out, enveloping them in his own, large and strong and callused from years of drawing and cooking and surgery.

“Will… Abigail isn’t here.”

How ridiculous. Will would certainly know if his own daughter wasn’t home, wouldn’t he? And, yes, she’s there again, standing at the other end of the table with an expression as puzzled and hurt as he’s sure his own must be.

“Papa? Daddy?” She asks tremulously, blue eyes welling with tears that make Will feel as though his heart is being ripped out. Nobody so much as glances at her. And then Hannibal moves, placing himself in Will’s direct line of sight and making Will have to tilt his head to see Abby over his shoulder.

“Do you feel like she’s still here?” He queries, soft and gentle, and Will wants to scream, because why is he doing this, why is he saying these things when their Abigail is _right there?_

One of Hannibal’s cheeks lifts to cup his cheek. “Abby,” Will whispers, staring heartsick at the tears that flow down his little girl’s face, a ragged sob tearing out of her. Will suddenly remembers her painful certainty -- _Why does he hate me? He wants me to go away. He hates me._

“She’s not here. Love, I know you know.”

“Know what?” Will asks, leaning into the warmth of his husband’s touch even as he’s filled with a cold, creeping dread.

Hannibal takes a shuddering breath and tilts his head forward until their foreheads are pressed together, and all Will can see is his whiskey-colored eyes. “Will, _mylimasis_ , Abby has been dead for sixteen years.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Dark Blue" -- Jack's Mannequin  
> "Train in New York" -- Dustin O'Halloran  
> "It's Gonna Be Good" -- Next to Normal soundtrack  
> "He's Not Here" -- Next to Normal soundtrack
> 
> [Abigail in Mizumono voice] I'm so sorry


	4. what it's like to die alive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again my loves, please be aware that this chapter contains a brief moment of (non-graphic) self-harm, some brief suicidal ideation/idealization of death, and a lot of arguing and blame-laying between our two favorite lads. Eventually, they're going to be alright or at least getting better, but for the moment, healthy communication, thy name is not Hannigram.

Will feels the world disappear from under him, as though he’s been flung off a cliff. But before he can think of how to respond, Clarice beats him to it.

“This is fucked up.”

“Language, Clarice!” Hannibal snaps, not stepping or looking away from Will.

There’s an awful scraping sound as their daughter suddenly shoots out of her chair with a screech, _“Fuck this!”_

And she bolts up the stairs. A moment later, Will hears a door slam. He can’t bring himself to care. Her friend _\-- Something with an A. What was it? Will knows they were introduced, why can’t he remember?_ \-- slips out the door with an uncomfortable, stuttered excuse. Will pulls out of Hannibal’s gentle grip, crossing again to the table. All the candles have gone out, wax all melted, except for one. Still flickering weakly, waiting for a guest of honor who will never arrive. Will closes his hand around the flame, barely even registering the sharp burn against his fingers, even as he hears Hannibal gasp softly behind him.

“What about the new medications?” He asks after a heavy moment of silence.

Will turns around, tilting his head to the side in a grotesque mockery of the playful teasing they used to enjoy. “We have the least depressed septic tank on the block.”

With a sigh, Hannibal runs a hand down his face, pulling at the skin in his exasperation. He never used to do that, back when they first met, but years together have made certain habits of each of them rub off on the other. “Why would you do that, Will? They were working.”

“They weren’t,” Will snaps, “They really weren’t. I felt like shit.”

“So we’ll go back to the doctors, we’ll get another round, or a higher dose, or a different medicine—”

“ _We_ won’t do anything. It’s _my_ head.” He grabs the cake off the table, shouldering past his husband to carry it back through the open entryway between dining room and kitchen, and he starts to scrape the cake into the trash. No use in a birthday cake, after all, when the birthday can’t truly be celebrated.

“Darling, please. I know this is difficult.”

“You know?” Will drops the cake into the trashcan, tray and all, and spins back around towards Hannibal. “What exactly do you know?”

“I know you’re hurting. I am, too. We were both her fathers, Will, not just you.”

“Fuck you,” Will spits out, “You have no idea how I feel. What it’s like to live in my head.” 

“I would know if you would tell me.”

“You want me to tell you? About what, huh? About how I read obituaries in the paper and think _God, I wish that was me, so I wouldn’t have to hurt like this anymore_?”

Hannibal lets out a small hiss, like he’s injured. Will knows he should feel bad about that, but he doesn’t. It feels good to give him even a tiny portion of the pain Will feels.

“You want me to tell you how I feel like I’m screaming, all the time, at the top of my lungs, but nobody ever hears? Or how I constantly feel like I’m falling off a cliff, like I can feel myself plummeting down but I never hit the ground, so I’m always waiting for the smash but never know when it’s going to happen? Is _that_ what you want to hear, Doctor Lecter?”

Hannibal jerks a step back, as if Will has actually struck him.

“Will—”

“No! You wanted me to talk, I’m talking. You shut the hell up and listen.”

Amazingly, as stunning as a miracle from heaven, Hannibal shuts his mouth obediently.

“I feel like a fugitive, Hannibal. Like I’m… I’m constantly running away from something. From the past, from her, from my own mind. I’m running because something is chasing me, and I know that if it gets me, it’ll kill me. But I don’t know what I’ve done.”

“What is it you’re so afraid of? Can you tell me why sometimes I’m afraid it’s me?” Hannibal moves forward, a hand outstretched, and Will yanks himself away, despite the spark of hurt that flares in Hannibal’s eyes. “Can I touch you?”

Will shakes his head no, still too overwhelmed for contact, wrapping his arms around himself for the pressure.

“Will, we’ve been doing so well lately. What changed? How could something go wrong without me noticing?”

Will snorts at that, running a hand through his hair in frustration. “You were so busy being happy that things seemed normal, you couldn’t be assed to bother checking if I was doing as good as you thought I was.”

“We’re in this together, Will. Remember? I’ve been here for you since before all this, and I’ll be here until the end of it. I’m not going to give up on you, even when it’s difficult.”

“You don’t care. You never even talk about her.”

Hannibal tilts his head as he deliberates, another habit he’s picked up from Will. “I thought not talking about her would make it easier for you to let go of her. Best to leave her in the past and move on with our lives.”

 _Let go. Move on._ The words feel like a knife slid into his belly. “Our daughter is not _spilled milk_ , you son of a bitch.”

“I care, Will. Of course I do. I miss her too, I grieve her too. If you think I don’t care because I don’t express my pain the same way you do, then maybe that’s a flaw in you, not me.”

“You don’t hurt like I hurt,” Will snaps, “If you felt the same way I do, you’d be just as much a wreck as me.”

“And what will you do with that perception, then? Lash out at me? Hurt me? Leave me, so we both fall into the sea of our sadness alone?”

Will opens his mouth to respond, but before he can form the words he wants, another voice, soft and high and impossible, floats from the staircase.

“Hey dads, it’s me.”

Will knows, he _knows_ it can’t be real, that the Abigail they knew and loved died many years ago. But she’s there, leaning on the bannister of the landing, wind-chafed and pretty, and the teenager she should have grown into. And Will loves her, her loves her so desperately that he’s willing to ignore how she can’t possibly be real.

“Could you let me go under?” Hannibal is still speaking, standing before the chair Will has sunk into at the sight of their impossible daughter -- Hallucination, ghost, whatever it is that he sees -- but Will hears him as though his voice is reaching him through water, or fog.

“Why can’t you see me, Papa?” Abigail pushes herself off the bannister, strolling down the final few steps to the kitchen as if she belonged there.

“Would you watch me drown, Will?”

Abigail is next to the counter island, now, leaning on it with all the casual insolence of a teenager -- Abigail never had the chance to be a teenager, but he can see her so clearly now, how can he see her if she truly is gone?

“Or is it that you just don’t _want_ to see me?”

“Is our relationship that badly damaged?” Hannibal asks, kneeling at Will’s feet, “Or is your psyche so bruised that you need to lash out at me to feel some kind of control?”

Will can’t answer. Hannibal on his knees, their dead daughter over his shoulder, is too much to try to process.

“You’re waiting for something he can’t do, Papa, for something he isn’t able to give you.” Abigail sounds so sweet, so bright and sharp in her defense of him. Will feels tears start to spill from his eyes, watching them both, the two sides of his heart that cannot connect, like magnets repelling each other. Hannibal gently wipes the tears away with his thumb, cradling Will’s face in his hand like it’s the most priceless thing he’s ever touched.

“Tell me what to do, Will.”

“Look at me.” Abigail hisses, leaning over the counter towards her fathers.

“Tell me who to be.”

This time, Abigail’s voice is practically a shriek, all but lunging over the morgue-like steel with the agile grace of a predator. _“Look at me!”_

“You don’t know,” Will whispers, voice shaking. Even if Hannibal thinks he does, even if he’s mourning too, he has no way of knowing the way it feels to be in Will’s mind, the things he sees and hears despite knowing that they can’t be rational or true.

“Teach me, then. Help me understand you again. I’m not going anywhere, my love. I’m going to be here, holding onto you, no matter what.”

Over his shoulder, there is no more Abigail.

Will lets out a tearing, painful sob, and buries his face in Hannibal’s chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "You Don't Know" -- Next to Normal soundtrack  
> "I Am The One" -- Next to Normal soundtrack  
> "What's The Use of Feeling (Blue)" -- Steven Universe soundtrack
> 
> This feels a little short to me, but this part just felt so emotionally intense that I decided it needed a chapter to itself. In my documents, this part was saved as "pain".


	5. more than memory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not gonna lie, I cried writing this chapter. Didn't cry writing the last two, but while I was writing this one, Dear Theodosia came on and I cried a whole lot.

They’ve only been married for a year when they meet Abigail. When they start the adoption process, a few people raise their eyebrows about that. Murmurs of _“Doesn’t it seem a little soon?”_ and _“Are you two sure you’re ready for that kind of thing?”_ follow them like their shadows. Will hates it, the scrutiny and judgment they get, the sidelong glances and criticisms disguised as concern. Once, after one too many thinly-veiled prods about their suitability to raise a child, Will snaps at Jack Crawford that if one of them was biologically capable of carrying a baby, it probably would have happened by accident already and nobody would question if they were “ready”.

Jack can’t look either of them in the eye for a week, but poor, usually-unflappable Hannibal’s flustered squawk of _“Will!”_ is worth it.

“Will there be a scar? On her throat?” Garrett Jacob Hobbs is dead, and his wife as well, and even though he knows the baby will be taken care of and looked after by the hospital staff, Will can’t bear to leave her. And Hannibal refuses to leave him, so they both stay, sitting by the metal and plastic hospital crib, watching Abigail Hobbs’s tiny chest rise and fall.

“Yes,” Hannibal hums, “Does that bother you?”

“She’s going to have a mark her whole life from her father trying to kill her, when she’s barely even started her life. Yes, that bothers me.” Will sighs, leaning back against Hannibal’s chest.

“She won’t remember it. Or if she does recall anything later in life, it will be so blurry and confusing that she’ll assume it was a nightmare.”

“I’ll remember, though.”

Hannibal rests his chin atop Will’s head. It makes him feel secure and safe, to be held and surrounded by Hannibal. His husband, who tenderly wiped Hobbs’s blood from his glasses, who held his hands until they stopped shaking, who kept the fragile little life in front of them alive in their hands on that blood-slick kitchen floor.

“You saved her life a few hours ago, Will. You also orphaned her in the same moment. It’s understandable that you would feel some obligation towards her, some responsibility for her well-being.”

“Don’t you?”

“Yes. I feel a remarkable amount of obligation.”

Will tilts his head, presses a kiss to the underside of Hannibal’s jaw. “I want to take her home, Han.”

Lips still against Hannibal's skin, Will can feel him smile. “I thought you might, _mano širdis_.”

The night they finally bring her home, she sleeps in their bed, her fathers curled around her like parentheses as she lays between them. Will lies awake, watching her little face for any flicker of discomfort, any hint of a nightmare troubling her little mind. Hannibal had, of course, reasonably pointed out that Abigail had been adjusted to sleeping in her own room with her biological parents, and in the hospital, but Will had convinced him that it would soothe all three of them to spend their first night as a family together, and Hannibal relented.

“You need to sleep, beloved,” Hannibal whispers as their eyes meet over Abigail’s head.

Will can’t help a small, sleepy smile at that. “You wanna be the pot or the kettle?”

“I am awake because you are awake. You simply refuse to go to sleep.”

Will reaches out, and Hannibal, always so attuned to Will’s needs, meets him in the middle. Their fingers lace together overtop their new daughter’s tiny body, soaking in the warmth from each other and her. “I can’t quite believe it,” Will confesses, “She’s here with us, forever, and we’re her dads. Finally. It almost feels like some kind of dream I’m scared to wake up from.”

Hannibal’s thumb rubs against the back of Will’s hand. He says slowly, “Your name is Will Graham-Lecter...”

“I don’t need grounding right now, dumb psychiatrist,” Will laughs, as quietly as he can manage, but his voice is full of affection. “I just need… I need us to stay like this. Forever.”

Hannibal sets Abigail’s highchair right next to the kitchen island, and always deposits her into it before he starts cooking. He puts a tiny chef hat on her head, hands her a plastic spatula to wave around, and explains every step of the recipe as though he fully expects her to absorb every word.

Will is utterly charmed by his devotion, but he can’t help teasing. “You realize she’s more likely to throw that plastic into your food than actually remember anything you’re saying, right?” He asks one evening as Hannibal makes dinner, leaning against the counter.

“Nonsense. If Abigail is going to be my sous-chef one day, she needs to start learning now.”

“Oh, I’m losing my spot that easy, am I?”

Hannibal glances up from his work to shoot him a wry smile. “Not until she learns to safely use a knife.”

As if she’s agreeing, Abigail shrieks in delight and smacks the counter with her spatula, making Will wince and Hannibal simply looks at Abigail with an expression of fond exasperation.

“Thank you, _mažylis_ , for your contribution to this conversation.”

And his voice is so deadpan, so polite, like the tone he would use with one of his fancy opera associates, that Will is caught between the urge to laugh and the urge to kiss him.

Abigail has been with them for three weeks when she first says it. She had already been talking some, with the Hobbses, and she still babbles often, but they seem more random vocalizations than attempts at words. Hannibal theorizes that her apparent verbal regression is rooted in a combination of the time and pain it took for the gash in her throat to heal, and a reaction to the trauma of almost dying and witnessing the deaths of her parents. Of course, since Abigail can’t tell them about what she does or doesn’t remember, they have no way of knowing for certain.

But, on this specific morning, Will goes to wake Abigail only to find her already awake, sitting quietly in her crib with a sort of patient stillness that seems almost unsettling for a child barely a year old. But when Will approaches the crib, her big blue eyes light up, and she raises her chubby arms in a clear request to be held.

“Good morning, Abby,” He says, scooping her into his arms, “What are you doing awake already, huh?”

And Abby replies, “Da!”

Will freezes in place, staring down at her. It feels as though his brain, constantly moving, humming thing that it is, has suddenly gone still and silent, for the first time he can remember. For a brief, hysterical moment, he thinks he can faintly hear the Windows shutdown noise. _Will dot exe has stopped working._

“Excuse me?” It feels like the appropriate way to respond, somehow. I beg your pardon, literal infant, would you care to repeat that? He strictly orders himself not to overreact, that he can’t even be sure that she’s saying what he thinks she is. She could simply be making random noises that happen to sound like words.

But then Abigail reaches up and yanks on a little fistful of his hair, repeating “Da!” with something very much like irritation. As if she’s thinking, _come on, buddy, catch up with the program here._

Will, being a responsible adult, definitely does _not_ race down the stairs, yelling his jubilation for Hannibal and the rest of the neighborhood to hear, but it’s a very close thing.

The idea of Clarice starts as a whisper, a discussion in the dark. Abigail is asleep, finally, but lying content only on Hannibal’s chest, both of them half-frightened to attempt moving her to the crib for fear that she’ll wake. They both lie awake in their bed, watching her warily for any sign she might rouse and cry.

“You were an only child,” Hannibal murmurs, one finger stroking gingerly along their daughter’s round cheek.

“I was,” Will acknowledges, “And you had Mischa.” They don’t speak much of her, the delicate, forever-innocent specter who still haunts Hannibal’s heart. They have spoken of her more, now that Abigail is in their lives, and bears Mischa as a middle name, but Hannibal doesn’t like to share his memories of her often. For him to bring up the subject of siblings must mean something important.

“I did. But Mischa was several years my junior. I was lonely for much of my childhood, and after Mischa was born, I often felt like more of a parent to her than a brother.”

And then it clicks. “Both of us were lonely. You don’t want Abby to be lonely.” 

“I don’t.”

Will reaches over to press his hand to Hannibal’s cheek, gently applying just enough pressure to get his husband to turn his head, to meet Will’s eyes rather than gazing contemplatively at Abigail.

“You want another kid?”

“I think it would be good for Abigail to have a companion to grow up with. It’s something to consider, at the least.”

“Something to consider,” Will echoes, and he loves them both so deeply at that moment that the idea of another child, a fourth member to round out their little family, seems like it would make everything perfect.

* * *

“It’s like they can’t even see me,” Clarice sighs, the day after her dead sister's birthday, when Ardelia has miraculously agreed to come over again. “Like, Papa is so busy taking care of Dad, and Dad is… he’s sick. I know he’s sick. It’s not his fault that his mind plays tricks on him. But it still hurts, sometimes, that so much of his attention goes to someone who…”

“Who isn’t real?” Ardelia supplies, and the compassion in her eyes, even if she doesn’t quite understand, makes Clarice want to weep. She rubs the back of Clarice’s hand with her thumb.

“Who died before I was born,” Clarice agrees, “I feel like I’m… competing against her, almost. For Dad’s love. But it’s not a fair fight because Abigail is… she’s not real. She’s a fake version of what Abigail could have grown up into that Dad’s mind made up because he couldn’t handle losing her. In his mind, Abigail is the perfect kid, everything he could want in a daughter. And then there’s me. Real and here and imperfect, and he loves his dead kid more than his alive one.”

It isn’t until she hears a soft, pained sound behind her that she realizes why Ardelia has suddenly gone so still. She turns, and there in the doorway is her dad, pale and exhausted, with his eyes red-rimmed. Clarice should apologize. She should want to make it better.

“It’s the truth, isn’t it? She’s the one you really want to be here.”

“Clarie…”

“She’s so precious and special because she isn’t real. I can’t ever live up to her or be as perfect as her because she’s all in your head. You can make her be anything you want. You wish she was alive and I was dead.”

Dad flinches. Somehow that makes Clarice feel better.

“You know… You know that’s not true.” His voice sounds gravelly and raw, like he’s been crying. She thinks she knows the sound of her parents’ after-cry voices better than most girls her age should. “You’re our… our pride and joy, everything we could have asked for. You’re the best part of our lives.”

“I don’t feel like it. I feel like second-best.”

Her dad looks small and sad and helpless. He shouldn’t. She wants him to get angry, to yell and fight, or ground her, or something, _anything_ , like a normal parent.

“Clarice, you know I love you. I’m not perfect and my brain likes to work against me, make it hard for me to feel things or make me feel too much, but I do love you. I… I love you as much as I can.”

 _As much as I can._ It feels like a slap to the face. She steps back, away from him, and his hand lifts, feebly, as if he wants to reach for her but stops himself. She slams the door.

* * *

When Will retreats to his bedroom, ashamed and hurt and burning up with his own uselessness, Hannibal isn't there, but Abigail is. She's sitting on the edge of his and Hannibal's bed, her feet not quite reaching the ground. She looks pretty and normal and real.

"What are you?" Will asks.

But Abigail, beautiful, impossible Abigail, smiles brightly and replies, "You know what I am. I'm what you want me to be. I'm everything that could have been."

Well, okay, he hadn't expected any kind of answer, so a cryptic and confusing one must count as a success.

"Are you a ghost? A hallucination? Why do I keep seeing you when I know you aren't real?"

She tilts her head thoughtfully, something she never did in life, but apparently a habit his subconscious thinks she would have picked up from him. "Aren't I real? It's not so clear sometimes."

So his imaginary kid can apparently have some kind of existential crisis. That's just fucking fabulous, and probably has great implications for his mental stability.

"I'm as alive as you are, Daddy," Abigail chirps, hopping up from the bed and hugging him, pressing her face into his chest like a little girl. She feels real, solid and warm, and full of life, despite the fact that he knows it shouldn't be possible. "Because you need me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Dear Theodosia" -- Hamilton soundtrack  
> "Superboy and the Invisible Girl" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "I'm Alive" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack


	6. flying headfirst into fate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLEASE BE AWARE THAT THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS A SUICIDE ATTEMPT. It isn't detailed or graphic (I wrote it to occur "offscreen"/not shown in the text), but it is there and if you think you could be triggered even reading about it/the implication of it, please feel free to skip this chapter. Your mental and emotional health is much more important than one chapter of a silly fanfiction. Please take care of yourselves. It is discovered in the last section of this chapter, so you can feel free to even just skip the segment after Will's dance with Abigail. I can provide a summary of this chapter, or just the last part, in the notes of the next chapter (or in the comments if anyone asks for one there) for anyone who feels they can't read this chapter itself.

Hannibal convinces Will to go back to Doctor Dahmer. Of course he does. And Will agrees, despite how he feels like Dahmer hadn’t helped in the first place. Will shares how his previous medications affected him -- That heavy, bottomless _nothing_ dragging him down -- and the doctor promises that he will try to avoid those kind of side-effects in the future. He suggests that, in the meantime, they attempt talk therapy to help things along as they work on finding a medicine that actually helps.

“Therapy doesn’t work on me,” Will says immediately, but the thought of Hannibal’s disappointment if he heard that Will didn’t even try is enough for him to at least make an effort.

They make another appointment, to sit and talk properly. Will recites the events of his past that led him here with a practiced detachment. He’s used to baring his history to doctors who want to fumble around in his mind like a teenager on prom night fumbling with his date’s panties.

“Our friend Alana introduced us. Hannibal had been her mentor at Johns Hopkins, and I was teaching at the FBI academy. She made coffee dates with both of us that happened to be at the same place at the same time.”

“She set you up,” Doctor Dahmer hums, and Will shrugs. 

“I guess. At the time, I was pretty pissed off. I’m… not exactly the best at socializing, and here she was springing a stranger on me. Then he let slip that he was a psychiatrist and… _hoo boy_ , I was riled up. Slammed my coffee down and stormed right out. I’ve never been a huge fan of psychiatrists, most of them I’ve met have a tendency to try to pry into my brain. No offense.”

“None taken, of course.”

“He didn’t give up on me, though. Stubborn bastard. He told me once that he fell in love with me the moment I told him to fuck off.” A laugh slips out at the memory. It’s tired, rusty. He’s not used to laughing much.

“He won you over.”

“Something like that,” Will imagines, fleetingly, a winner’s podium like at the Olympics, Hannibal atop it with a gold medal around his neck: _Puts Up With Will’s Bullshit_. “He showed up at my classroom the next day. Super early in the morning, before any of my students showed up. He said I looked like I needed a proper meal and gave me eggs and sausage. And he kept turning up, bringing me coffee, and food, and talking things through with me when my empathy got overwhelming. He was sort of my… unofficial therapist for a while, I guess.”

Doctor Dahmer is writing something down on his little yellow notepad. Will wants to know what he’s writing. Probably something about how weird and possibly unethical it is for someone to give unofficial therapy to a potential significant other.

“So, really,” he continues, “It wasn’t really that he won me over, but more like he snuck up on me. I don’t remember falling in love with him, I just remember… realizing one day that he’d become part of my life, and that it would hurt like hell if he ever didn’t want to be part of it anymore.”

* * *

Abigail develops a fixation on Cinderella. Will doesn’t really understand it, but she loves the movie, the story, even the musical -- _Apparently there’s a Cinderella musical!_ Will hadn’t known about any of it, aside from the classic Disney movie, but Abigail has expressed an interest in something and Hannibal, naturally, took it and ran with it. All the way overboard.

He somehow gets ahold of every Cinderella adaptation he can find. He reads versions of the story to Abby in Lithuanian, in Italian, in Spanish and French and Japanese. He gets a copy of every film version he possibly can. Abby takes a special liking for a weird, trashy version from the early 2000s and Will loathes it, specifically because he has to keep repeating the phrase “Shut up, Hannibal, that frizzy twink does _not_ look like me.”

* * *

Clarice has a piano recital tonight. An audition, really, to Yale. If she performs well enough, she could get a full ride, and an early admittance. Come May, she could be gone, off to New Haven, to get away from this school, and all of the bullshit of her current life. Catonsville, where they live, has a community college, and a branch of the University of Maryland, and Clarice knows her fathers want her to attend one of those schools, but Yale has something they don’t -- Distance. Space. Time away from her parents, and their issues that Clarice can’t fix, even if she wanted to try.

She had told her parents about it when she got the date. Dad had brightly declared that he would put it on the calendar, despite Clarice pointing out that their calendar was still on April of last year. 

“Hey,” She turns and Ardelia is there, a beaming smile on her face and a small bouquet of roses in her hands.

“Hey,” Clarice takes the offered flowers with a smile of her own, allows Ardelia to kiss her cheek despite the anxious energy she’s certain must be rolling off her. “Did you see my parents out there?”

Ardelia’s smile droops ever so slightly. “I didn’t look. Do you want me to?”

“Please.”

* * *

Hannibal comes home one day, and simply pauses in the doorway to admire the view. Will is dancing around their living room, an awkward, nonsense sort of dance, Abigail in his arms. Will is humming, and both of them are looking at each other with such love and happiness that they don’t even notice Hannibal. Well, that certainly won’t do.

Setting his suitcase down by the door, he moves. As easy as breathing, he steps into the dance, pulling Will into his arms and spinning into the kind of proper waltz he learned as a boy. Holding Abigail, Will can’t exactly maintain the expected form, but Hannibal is good at leading. “Mind if I cut in?”

Will laughs, bright and joyful. “By all means, Doctor Lecter.”

Their giggling daughter gently nestled between their chests, like a third, shared heart, they twirl around the room.

* * *

“How am I supposed to feel better when the lines between real and unreal are blurring in my brain?”

Doctor Dahmer peers at Will over the top of that yellow notepad. “You need to sort out what in your brain is reality and what is delusion. Take what you know and then make it make sense.”

“My gauge of sense has been malfunctioning for about twenty years now, Doc.” Will sighs.

“You need to confront your trauma.”

Will imagines himself in a dark room, screaming at some misshapen humanoid being, blank-faced and eerie. _Take that, Trauma_. “What does that mean?”

“It means accepting that what you’ve been through is real, that it left scars on you. Admitting what you’ve lost and choosing to move forward and heal. In our first session, Will, you told me that in talking through your history, it feels like you’re talking about someone else. Make it about you.” 

* * *

Ardelia is back, and the smile on her face is just a tad too rigid to be natural. “I saw your pops, but…”

But. The most important night of her life and there’s a but. Of course there is. And if Ardelia has already seen her papa, then that can only mean one thing.

“My dad’s not here, is he?”

Ardelia shakes her head. Blinking back tears, Clarice shoulders her way past the other auditioners backstage and flees to the hallway, where she can have even a scrap of privacy. She can hear Ardelia following her, but doesn’t acknowledge her as she texts her papa: Hall outside stage door. Come get me.

She knows, rationally, that it must take longer, but it feels like she barely blinks before Papa is there, bending to her height like she’s a child again and scanning her face with his eyes.

“Clarice, _mažylė_ , what’s wrong?”

“Where is he?” She manages painfully through the lump in her throat. “He’s supposed to be here. I told you both weeks ago.”

“I don’t know.” It hurts to hear, but her papa has never lied to her, and for that Clarice is grateful. “I assumed he would meet us here, but he hasn’t, and he hasn’t answered my texts or calls.”

“I told him.” Her own voice sounds feeble and pleading.

“I know you did. But when you told us was right around when he stopped taking his medicine. He might not even remember that you have a recital.”

Great. Isn’t that just wonderful? Fan- _fucking_ -tastic. Once again, she’s overlooked, a non-priority. Forgotten. Invisible.

Clarice feels something inside herself plummet, like she’s falling from somewhere up high with no way of knowing what will catch her. Or if she’ll be caught.

“I want to go home.”

Papa’s eyes go very wide, and his hands cradle her face as if she’s fragile. Breakable. Like Dad. “But your audition. Yale…”

And without warning, the tears she had been holding back flow, ripped out of her with a jagged sob. “Papa, I wanna go _home!”_

“Okay,” Instantly, her papa’s strong arms are around her, holding her tight against his chest like she’s a little baby again. His voice is tender and soothing, and it’s just enough to anchor her. “Okay, little bird, okay. We can go home. We’ll talk to your dad and work everything out. It’s going to be okay. I promise.”

They leave, without Clarice auditioning for Yale, without so much as even giving a reason why she’s backing out. But Papa told her everything would be okay, and Papa has never lied.

* * *

Will is home alone. Clarice has a.. _thing_. He can’t quite remember what it is, but she definitely has a thing. Hannibal is there with her probably, but Will can’t bring himself to leave the house. He has some horrible, undefinable feeling that if he does, something terrible will happen. When Will makes his way down to the living room, Abigail is there.

Rather than the casual clothes he usually sees her in, she’s wearing a ballgown. The gown is black, with thin stripes that have the look of leaves or feathers, like the intricate design on the bodice. The scar on her neck is exposed, without the scarves or turtlenecks she usually covers it with, and it stands out in bright scarlet against her porcelain skin and ink-colored dress.

“Dance with me,” she says, holding out a hand, “Daddy, please?”

And when has Will ever been able to deny her? With a grin, he makes an exaggerated bow. “As you wish.”

Abigail tilts her head, a knowing smile on her face, and replies, “ _When he said as you wish, what he really meant was I love you_.”

Will takes her hand. “Every day, forever.”

So they dance around the living room, with more grace than Will has ever remembered possessing before. There is no music, yet somehow they remain in perfect sync, each movement flowing into the next as though they have spent their whole lives waltzing together. The whole time, his eyes remain on Abigail -- Her wide eyes, her delighted smile. His perfect, precious, impossible little girl. She cannot truly be here, some small and muffled part of him knows. But with her warm and happy in his arms, that part is easy to ignore.

“I want to stay like this forever,” he sighs as they finally still, standing in the middle of the living room with her head laid gently on his chest.

“You can.” Abigail looks up at him, and those robin’s egg eyes are so trusting, so loving, that he can’t tear his gaze from them.

“What?”

She steps back, though their hands are still linked and their eyes are still locked. “We can stay like this. Nothing bad could ever happen again. We can be happy, and safe, and together, forever, just like you want.”

Oh, Jesus in heaven, Will wants that. He wants it so much it aches in his chest. That’s all he’s ever wanted, for Abigail to be safe and happy and with him, always. He has lost and kept her all at once, seeing her but never truly having her, never being able to dote on her and protect her the way a father should.

“We are her fathers now,” Hannibal had murmured to him, on their last night it was just they two, the night the adoption paperwork was finalized, “We must serve her better than Garret Jacob Hobbs did.”

And at that memory, his mind seems to snag on Abigail’s suggestion of paradise. “Your papa,” he breathes, “Your sister.”

“They hate me,” Abigail snaps, and the fierceness in his voice startles him, “They hate me. And they hate you for still loving me.”

He thinks of Hannibal’s face when he saw Will with a birthday cake for the child they lost. Thinks of the bitterness in Clarice’s voice when she accused him of wanting her dead instead. The heavy fog of emptiness that dragged him down when he was medicated. Doctor Dahmer’s voice, sounding far away: _It feels like you’re talking about someone else. Make it about you_.

“It hurts,” Will whispers, and doesn’t know if he’s speaking to Abigail or the other memories in his mind. “God, it hurts so much.”

“I know,” her tone is sweet again, gentle and comforting. One hand lifts to cup his cheek, and he leans into the touch the same way he does when Hannibal makes the same gesture. “I can make the pain go away. There’s a place we can go, where you’ll never hurt again, and you’ll be with me.”

Will has never wanted anything more. “Show me.”

Abigail’s face lights up, and she takes a step backwards, tugging him along by the hand. “Come with me.”

And Will follows.

* * *

The house feels strange. Even when Dad is doing bad, even when his brain is being awful and hurting him and making him do strange things, Clarice can always tell where he is in the house. Can always hear something, some kind of noise letting her know that even if he doesn’t feel up to talking, or even seeing her, sometimes, at least he’s there. She isn’t alone. Tonight, though, the house feels still and empty.

“Dad?” 

If Clarice didn’t know better, she would swear her voice echoes.

“Dad, we’re home! Are you awake?”

Still nothing.

“Will?” Papa pulls the door shut behind them. “Where are you, _mylimasis_?”

There is no answer. Dad always responds to Papa’s voice, even on his worst days. Something heavy and cold settles in Clarice’s stomach. She and her papa make eye contact, and he nods towards the kitchen, where the stairs are. Clarice nods. Papa will look downstairs, Clarice will take the upstairs.

Confused, she heads to the second floor. _Ah_. There. She can hear water running, from the en-suite attached to her fathers’ bedroom. The light is off, but the bedroom door is open, so Clarice takes that as permission to go on in. The room is empty and dark, but she can see a sliver of light coming from the cracked-open door of the bathroom.

“Dad? Are you in the shower?”

No answer.

From downstairs, she can still hear her papa’s voice, calling, “Will? My love?”

Clarice takes another step towards the door and thinks suddenly, bizarrely, of the horror movies she has seen, of the naïve teenagers who descend into the frightening blackness despite the audience screaming _don’t go in the basement!_

“Dad, you’re worrying me. Are you mad at me? Is this a silent treatment thing? I’m sorry for the nasty stuff I said. I know you’re doing your best. Okay?”

“Will!” Papa’s voice is growing frantic, a desperation in his voice that she has never heard before, “ _Damn it_ , Will!”

“Dad, I’m gonna open the door, so… so if you’re naked, tell me right now.”

Silence. One hand raised to the side of her face, in case she has to shield her eyes, she pushes the door open.

Her dad is in the bathtub. He isn’t naked. But it’s worse. Oh, fuck, there’s so much, all over the tub…

_“Daddy!”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Cinderella" -- Steven Curtis Chapman  
> "Make Up Your Mind/Catch Me, I'm Falling" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "I Dreamed A Dance" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "There's A World" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack
> 
> I apologize if this chapter feels choppy, but one of the songs this chapter is inspired by is complex and multi-part in a way that made the choppiness of the writing seem necessary. Once again, please take care of yourselves.


	7. as the black hole opens wide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters in one day because I had inspiration and zero impulse-control! Be forewarned, this chapter contains discussion of Will's suicide attempt, and brief description/depiction of the wounds he acquired in said attempt. This one is short, but I figured we needed a little peek into Hannibal's head right now, and it felt so intense that I decided it deserved a chapter all its own. I call this one "Hannibal Feels His Feelings."

Hannibal sits in an uncomfortable plastic chair, holding his husband’s limp hand and examining the stitching holding Will’s skin closed. It was a good job, he had to admit. He personally thinks he might have been able to do better, under difference circumstances, but he also knew that he should not be doing any sort of medical care on Will. Too emotionally involved to think clearly. He had been able to keep the wounds covered and slow the bleeding when Clarice found him, but Hannibal was logical enough to realize that he could not, emotionally, be expected to give aid with a clear, rational head. He had been panicking, even though he’d tried to hide it from Clarice. It was the first time Hannibal could recall his hands shaking as he tried to save a life.

His eyes drifted from the wounds, red and raw and horrible, to his beloved’s face, tranquil for once under the influence of sedatives and painkillers. Hannibal’s eyes stung with tears he was too stubborn to shed. Men like him, men of wealth and status and old, noble lineage, did not cry. “Foolish, reckless boy,” he whispered, gingerly pressing his lips to the slash on the arm whose hand he held. “How could you do something so thoughtless?”

Had he truly wanted to die? To hurt Clarice the way they both knew losing a parent hurt? To leave Hannibal alone, losing yet another of the few people he loved? It made him sick to think about it. Were his delusions that intense, his illness so severe, that he found death preferable to living? Hannibal has no answers, and that makes him angry.

He glances over his shoulder. On the stiff little hospital couch, Clarice is asleep, still in her audition dress, with Will’s favorite coat draped over her. It smells like Will’s cheap aftershave, which Hannibal loathes, but Will refuses to change. Clarice, he knows, finds the scent comforting due to its association with Will, and so he had grabbed it as they scrambled out to door to give her even a small bit of comfort. She is deeply asleep, not reacting at all to the sound of Hannibal’s voice. Good.

“ _Niekšas_ ,” he spits, anger and hurt and betrayal making his tongue coarse, “Why would you do something so stupid? You could have talked to me, or your doctor, or anyone at all. Anything but this. You would make me bury another person I love, even after what we went through? _Figlio di puttana_. I let you into my heart and you try to rip it out of me. How could you be so _selfish_ , Will?”

His sight blurs, and Hannibal realizes that he is crying. Damn. With his free hand, he wipes angrily at his eyes, pressing too hard and making little spots of light bloom in his vision and obscuring Will momentarily from view.

He was tired of being strong. All his life, he had been strong. When his parents and sister died. When he nearly starved in an orphanage. When his uncle died. When his brilliant, captivating Will’s brain was boiling itself in his skull, when Will was hallucinating, weeping and seizing and alternating between begging him for help and accusing him of unspeakable things. When they had to bury their little girl.

Through all of that, Hannibal had been strong, had kept his chin up and carried on as if none of it weighed on him a single ounce. It was exhausting. No one had ever offered him comfort, or to carry his burdens, or let him lean on them to be weak for just a moment. And now, Will, his partner, the first person to make him feel truly loved since Mischa, so lost in illness and despair that he viewed dying as a better option than continuing to live his life. How much more suffering could one man be expected to stoically endure?

“Did you even think about me?” He whispers, throat aching, “Or our daughter? Did you consider what you would be leaving in your wake, all the pain and suffering we would feel with you gone? You aren’t the only one in this family who’s hurting, you know, and you only would have made it worse. Stupid, sweaty, twitchy little man.”

Will’s hand is held so tightly in his that Hannibal is vaguely surprised that the pressure hasn’t woken him. For all the anger he feels now, he knows it is merely another shape given to hurt and fear -- He has come perilously close to losing his beloved, and that terrifies him beyond words, beyond any language he knows. If he loses Will, he knows instinctively, he won’t be able to bear it. That would be the final straw, the last of a long list of agonies. He would lose himself to his sorrow. Even the faintest imagining of such a loss spears through him like a bullet. Slowly, he lifts Will’s hand to his lips and brushes a kiss across his knuckles.

“Wake up, you little fool. Look at me. Speak to me. Cry, scream, hit me, whatever you want to do. Just wake up and live. Or I’ll kill you myself.”

Will’s hand twitches in his.

And then those sapphire eyes blink slowly open, and it feels like a fist to the chest, the hope and frustration and relief and _love_ that floods Hannibal in that moment.

“Huh… Hann?”

This time, Hannibal doesn’t fight the tears that roll down his face as he holds his husband’s hand to his own cheek. “ _Mielasis_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song for this chapter:
> 
> "I've Been" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack


	8. lose my mind for you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, this chapter contains discussion of Will's suicide attempt and description of his wounds. Nothing graphic or intense, but please be mindful and protect your own mental health. Another short-ish chapter, but that seems to be what my brain wants to pump out at the moment.

Henry Dahmer pauses before he enters this specific hospital room. He knows everything, of course, but he grabs the file before heading inside and gives it a quick scan.

_Graham-Lecter, William Thomas. Age 45. Recurrent viral encephalitis with hallucinations and delusions, attempted suicide._

“I want to go home,” His patient demands as soon as he walks in. Henry sighs. 

“Will, you can’t go home yet. Legally, we have to hold you for 72 hours, since you tried to hurt yourself.”

Will snorts, and holds his arms out to display the long, angry-looking gashes, one on each arm, currently being held together by black thread. They will heal, but he will always have the scars. Physical marks, now, to match the invisible ones on his soul. “I _succeeded_ hurting myself, Doc. What I _attempted_ was killing myself, and it obviously didn’t go to plan.”

“Now isn’t exactly the best time for humor, Will.”

“What are you going to do? Lock me up here and throw away the key?”

* * *

As Will’s husband and therefore next of kin, with Will in a psychiatric hold, Hannibal is the one who now has to discuss further treatment. Nothing will be done without Will’s consent, of course, but due to his recent attempt, for the time being, he’s considered just unstable enough that he’s not entirely capable of making informed decisions.

Even as a doctor and a psychiatrist himself, Doctor Dahmer’s suggestion sets off alarm bells in his brain. It’s still done, sometimes, but not as frequently as it has been used in the past. It’s a last resort, a desperate measure taken only when nothing else will work. The process has been greatly improved from the historical methods made famous by popular culture, of course, but the idea has lingered in the general psyche, an image of terror and pain.

Thinking his husband might be more understanding if it comes from him, Hannibal promises to discuss the option with Will.

* * *

“Shock therapy? But that’s torture!” Clarice protests when Hannibal mentions it. She’s a clever girl, his little bird, and currently elbow-deep in AP English -- She’s insisted on continuing her schoolwork from home, determined to stay busy as if nothing has changed. Hannibal knows the syllabus of books she’s read this semester, can almost see the wheels turning in her brain, knows the connection she will make. “You’re going to McMurphy Dad!”

There it is. Hannibal wonders if she’s picturing it right now, her beloved dad strapped to a table like Frankenstein’s Monster, writhing in pain, head smoking. Will’s eyes empty, staring blankly at the ceiling, stripped of everything that made him _Will_. It makes Hannibal want to cringe.

“It’s not like that, Clarice. The modern procedure is clean and simple. Barely enough watts to turn on a lightbulb.”

She looks entirely unconvinced, eyeing him with something uncomfortably close to mistrust. “ _One flew east, one flew west_ …”

* * *

Will, as expected, hates the idea entirely. He openly laughs in Hannibal’s face when he tentatively brings it up.

“Be serious, darling.”

“Oh no. No, you don’t. Don’t you dare. You don’t get to _darling_ me right now.” His hands are trembling, strength in his arms still recovering after the trauma and blood-loss they endured.

“Will…”

“Oh, fuck off. You don’t get to suggest I get my brain fried to goo and then call me darling, it doesn’t work like that.”

Hannibal wonders, for just a moment, at how very alike his husband and daughter are, despite their conflicts.

“It’s not like that,” He finds himself repeating, “It’s simple and safe and clean. Barely enough to turn on a lightbulb.”

“I’ve seen this movie before, Hannibal. I hated it. You’re not walking me down the Green Mile.”

Hannibal bites his lip. Despite himself, despite the venom in Will’s voice, he can’t help but think about the uncanny parallels, even through the great discrepancies of situation. An empath, seeing too much, feeling too much, exhausted by all the horrors of the world and by the mental toll it takes on him to absorb it all. John Coffey. Will Graham.

“This could help you, Will, not… put you out of your misery.”

“ _I’m tired, Boss_ ,” Will drawls, exaggerating his accent for effect.

“I’m tired, too, Will.”

That seems to startle Will out of his sarcastic anger. “Excuse me?”

“I’m tired of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Or waking up every day wondering what version of you I’m going to get today. Always trying to help you and you fighting me every step of the way because you’re scared to move on.”

“You think I’m scared.”

“Yes. Yes, I do. I think you’re scared and you’re sick and I want so badly to fix things for you, my love, but I can’t. You can’t keep holding onto what we’ve lost and trying to go back in time. We can’t keep going on like this.”

“If you could see the things I see—”

“I can’t. I can’t read your mind, Will. I can hold you, I can do my best to help you, to be your anchor in all this, but I can’t see and understand the way your mind or your illness works.”

Will watches him, tears welling up in those wide blue eyes, and it makes Hannibal feel like the cruelest monster in the world to know he caused those tears.

“I don’t know what that’s like for you. But I know I’ve been here, right beside you, the whole time. I’m with you in this, my love. So don’t leave me to go through it alone.”

“You’re not alone. You have Clarie.”

“Is that what you told yourself?” Hannibal asks, “That she and I would be alright if you died because we’d have each other?” Will flinches, and that is answer enough. “Clarice is a _child_. We both lost parents at a young age, you know how that feels. How could you want to put our daughter through that?” 

Will closes his eyes. It’s a defense mechanism, Hannibal knows. When Will looks, he sees too much, so he removes sight from the equation to protect himself. He knows the reasoning, that doesn’t mean he likes it.

“Clarie has you. And her girlfriend, whatever her name is. Abby only has me.”

_“Abigail is dead, Will!”_

Will yanks away from him as though Hannibal has physically struck him, pulling his legs up to his chest and wrapping his arms around his knees. A sob shakes his whole body, and Hannibal feels a vague sense of guilt, as if the emotion is reaching him from far away.

“She doesn’t need you, or me, or anything,” He continues despite that, “She’s gone. She’s been dead for sixteen years, she stopped needing anything a long time ago.”

“Don’t—”

“No. Listen to me. I know that your brain confuses you, I know you hear things and see things, I know you think she’s still around. But she isn’t. It’s just in your head. The Abigail you think you know is just a hallucination, something your illness created to protect you from the reality of losing her. She isn’t here, Will. Clarice is here. I am here. Don’t we matter to you?”

Will looks up, tears streaming slowly down his cheeks. “Of course you do.”

“Then act like it. Try to get better for us. Our daughter needs you to be healthy. And so do I.”

“Getting better requires a stable foundation, Hannibal. I feel like the moorings of my mind are built on sand.”

Hannibal sits on the bed beside his beloved, slowly, and is relieved when Will allows it. “I’m not sand. I am bedrock. If you can’t rely on yourself, rely on me.”

Will takes his hand. It’s the first time since The Incident that Will has been the one to initiate contact, and Hannibal is tempted to hold his breath. “I do. But it’s so much, all the time… my heart feels so heavy.”

Hannibal raises that hand to his lips, presses a kiss to the palm, and watches Will smile, faint and watery, in response. “I’ll carry it for you. I can handle the weight of a heart, if it’s yours.” 

“Atlas in the garden,” Will whispers, and he holds still to let Hannibal tenderly wipe his tears away.

“You are my world.”

Will scoots closer, still semi-curled into a ball, but now pressed against Hannibal’s side. “Okay. I’ll try it, the treatment. For you and Clarie.”

“And for yourself, to get past the ghosts in your brain.”

The weight of Will’s head rests on Hannibal’s shoulder, and he wraps himself around the trembling, weeping man that he loves more than life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs for this chapter:
> 
> "Didn't I See This Movie" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack  
> "A Light In The Dark" -- Next to Normal Soundtrack
> 
> The references Clarice and Will make in this chapter, in case anyone missed/didn't grasp them are to One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, which involved a torturous form of electroconvulsive therapy, and a later lobotomy of the main character, and The Green Mile, the story of an empath on Death Row for crimes he didn't commit, who is executed via electric chair.
> 
> Small fun fact, Will's middle name being Thomas is a small shout-out of sorts to Thomas Harris.


End file.
